"Always remember that wings alone will not fly high, that the road that no one passes will be green again, and that ships will not cross the sea with empty rudders." These were the words Abu Bakr had once spoken to his crew, but now, fifty-seven days since their departure, they felt like an echo lost to the vastness of the sea. "As for the hour, I don't know," he wrote, his thoughts drifting like the ship on the endless waters. "The hours don't matter anymore; time here is only day and night, with the sunset and sunrise in between. And only they give us a sense of life. Otherwise, the days pass by, and we exchange observations among ourselves—maybe we pass a small island to shelter on for a while, to feel stability under our feet, even for minutes. Or maybe we reach that imaginary land."
They gathered for dinner in the last light of the sun, sharing stories—tales that no one questioned, as they served only to relieve the weight of longing for their families and the land they could no longer see. The waves continued to crash against the bottom of the ship, reminding them of the journey's uncertainty. "The sea stretches forever," Abu Bakr mused, the words resonating in the minds of the sailors. "The sea extends forever."
One sailor, his thoughts heavier than the storm clouds gathering on the horizon, reflected on his decision to leave everything behind. "How did I convince myself to leave my business, which was finally showing results, to leave everything I had worked on for years? I told myself it was time for me to achieve something no one else had, to write my name in the records of history in golden ink, so that everyone would remember me, not as a nobody. The average person, in my eyes, is just another number in the world's population, until history writes about him and then remembers him forever. That's what I wanted. To become one of the greats. But now, I wonder—does it really exist?"
The sailor's doubt grew as the ship sailed on, and that very night, the sky darkened, hiding the stars. A powerful wind blew, causing the waves to rise higher than ever before. The storm that followed was unlike anything they had ever seen, and in its fury, one of the ships was lost to the sea.